3. If I Only Had a Heeaarrghhh

Dorothea continued walking, the black wand clutched tightly in one hand and the bloodied nailed baseball bat in the other. Toto guarded her right side while the Scarecrow, which Dorothea had begun calling him because she had no way of learning his proper name, stumbled on her left. He walked rather well for someone who was butchered and left to die nailed to a wooden post. He hadn't managed to form many words, most of his responses being head tilts and low grunts, but he hadn't tried to hurt Dorothea or Toto, so she continued letting him tag along.

As they passed a forest of what used to be apple trees, her stomach began to rumble. She wished the apples were still juicy and fresh rather than the shriveled, discolored lumps that they were now. Dozens of them littered the ground, giving the whole forest a rotten smell. What used to be red apples were now a dark brown and what used to be green were now a dark yellow. Dorothea fought her gag reflex as they passed the foul-smelling forest, making their way down what was left of the Yellow Brick Road.

She repeatedly wondered what Munchkin Land and the rest of Oz looked like before the Witches destroyed it. She mused that it was pretty and lively, and didn't at all smell like mold and death.

A flash of silver caught her eye and she ventured to the right. Upon closer inspection, she discovered that what caught her attention had been a mechanic leg. She stepped around it, spotting another metal leg and a metal arm, all attached to a human-looking man. His face and torso were bloody and torn, and it didn't look like he was any better off than the Scarecrow. Dorothea gently kicked at one of the legs, earning a low groan in response. She jumped back slightly, still unused to what was supposed to be dead making noises. It mumbled something through barely-open lips, and Dorothea had to kneel down to understand it.

"What was that?" she asked.

"Oil can," the man murmured.

"Oil can?" she repeated in confusion, looking around. She spotted a small oil can sitting on a stump a few feet away, so she stepped around the man to grab it. She took a guess and began squirting oil into the creases of each mechanical limb, and the man groaned again. He began sitting up, with some help from Dorothea.

"What happened to you?" she asked.

"Wicked Witch," the man replied. Dorothea guessed that he wasn't a zombie, but she wondered what his story was. She helped him stand before asking.

"I was just a woodsman," he explained, sitting on a stump. "I would trim hedges and chop trees when they got too big. All was well. One day, I was really tired from working, but I wasn't done yet. I didn't have my usual strength, so when I tried to swing my axe down," Dorothea had just noticed the bloody, rusty axe held in the man's human arm, "I cut off my own hand by mistake." He lifted his left arm, wiggling his metal fingers.

"The Wicked Witch found me and promised to give me a new hand if I would work for her. At first I refused, but what good is a woodsman with only one arm? I reluctantly agreed, and she made me this hand and magically infused it with my arm so it would work just like a natural hand. What I didn't know was that she jinxed my axe, so I cut off more body parts than tree branches. She knew that I would have to keep going back to her for new limbs, so as long as I needed help, she had her own personal assistant."

"What did she want you to do?" Dorothea asked.

"Not much," the man replied. "Mostly spying. She wanted me to keep tabs on Gizelle and the munchkins; let her know when the town was weakest or if anyone was plotting against her."

"So what happened…?" Dorothea gestured to her own face.

He nodded. "I told her I didn't want to work for her anymore. I had quit being a woodsman, so I would stop cutting off my own body parts. She didn't like my disloyalty and sent her stupid monkeys after me. Those bastards have sharp claws. They tore at whatever they could reach and left me here to die."

"That's awful," the brunette replied. "Well… we're heading to see the Wizard. I want to go home, and if I can, I'd like to save Oz on my way."

"Can I join?" the man asked. "You can have my axe. I don't think it's jinxed anymore. I want nothing more than to get revenge on that damned Witch."

"Sure," Dorothea nodded. "I could use extra help."

"I have to warn you, though," the man said as he hobbled away from the forest. "When the Witch claimed me as her minion, she took away my heart. I don't feel very many emotions anymore. The only thing fueling me right now is the magic in my metal and my hatred for the witch. I won't turn on you without reason, but if things get dark like you get attacked, I may not help, either."

"Well, warning is nice," Dorothea countered. She considered her options and decided that a hatred-fueled metal man would make a decent sidekick since his anger was aimed at the Wicked Witch. "What's your name?"

"Tim," he replied.

"Tim the Tin Man," she smirked. "Welcome to the team, Tim."